Aden owed its importance to being well placed on the sea route from Suez to Australia, India and elsewhere in the Far East. Apart from trade and eventually being designated a Free Port, it was its location as a coaling station that allowed the port to develop in the second half of the 19th Century. After the 1st World War, its proximity to the oilfields in the Persian Gulf meant it was also in a position to be well located for offering oil bunkering facilities. In this Section will appear a variety of articles, largely based on statistics, to do with shipping up to the 2nd World War.